


only love (will win in the end)

by vatrixsta



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Explicit Sexual Content, F/M, so just go with it, this timeline makes exactly as much sense as the show
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-08
Updated: 2016-05-08
Packaged: 2018-06-07 05:14:13
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,381
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6786814
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vatrixsta/pseuds/vatrixsta
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A missing scene for 2x23 and an alternate ending to 5x20/slight speculation for 5x21. Emma loses Killian, but manages to unintentionally smuggle some contraband hope through the portal back home to Storybrooke.</p>
            </blockquote>





	only love (will win in the end)

**Author's Note:**

> I couldn't resist the siren call of Captain Swan another second. Finished this under the wire before it's Jossed tonight.

The thing is: as Charming pulled her through the portal (and she was glad, she supposed, that her father was there, because if he hadn’t been, if everyone else had been safely through, she wasn’t completely sure she could have left Killian there; he hadn’t meant the promise he made to her, to move on, anymore than she’d meant the promise she’d made to him, to keep her armor down and she just didn’t know if she could live the rest of her life knowing it would never be the best version of it and--) she kept thinking it over, and over. _I can’t lose anyone else. I can’t lose him. I’ve lost him and I can’t. Did I do everything I possibly could? I’d do anything, anything--_

~*~

The last place she expected to emerge was the Jolly Roger, gently swaying with the sea, no sign of her family or Storybrooke. The familiar sight of the Captain's quarters caused an ache to bloom in her chest and her eyes sparked with tears. She had the same strange feeling she’d had a moment before she woke up in her Bug and Neal crawled back into the crack of her heart she always left open for him, with his collect call and peaceful happiness and dire warning and she'd almost hate him for being right if she had ever learned how.

(Never mind that the two men she'd loved most in her whole life had both apparently managed to leave her. They had both wanted to stay with her, to some extent at least, but they were both better men than either knew, both willing to leave her behind for the greater good, but it didn’t feel that way, not when the end result was the same: she was the lost girl, the one Killian had seen coming a mile away and a mile up in the sky as they climbed a beanstalk and he knew, she was always so afraid he could see that she wasn’t enough to make anyone stay.)

"What the hell are you doing here?"

His voice, his voice. She turned to him and they just stared at each other, her with longing and disbelief, him with suspicion and distrust.

Emma wished she had a good answer to give this man, who was and wasn't the Killian she loved because he was dressed in his pirate garb and he held himself stiffly, and his hair was shorter, his blue, blue eyes darker, colder, and every wall she’d ever seen behind those eyes was firmly in place, as he looked at her warily... the way he had before he was hers.

(She wondered if that was really true, if there really was such a thing as a time that he wasn't hers, that she wasn't his. She thought that maybe there was only a time when they hadn't claimed each other yet, a lost boy and a lost girl who hadn't known how to care for themselves properly before the other came along. Then again he was dead and you couldn't really belong to someone who wasn't with you. She'd tried for ten years with Neal and he'd tried for three centuries with Milah, and look where that got both of them.)

"Where else would I be?" she asked him finally, a lot calmer than she'd thought herself capable.

"Doing whatever do-gooders do?" he wondered. "Throwing yourself over whatever sword is available instead of letting Regina lie in the bed she damn well made herself? Or perhaps you’ve come to your senses and stowed away with me."

It clicked then, in a strange way, because she suddenly knew exactly where she was.

"You took the bean," she said softly. There was no accusation in her voice the way there would have been if she were really who he thought she was. "You left us behind." _You left me behind._

He looked ashamed of himself for a moment, an expression she was well acquainted with on his face. But then his features hardened and he gave her the kind of infuriating smirk and shrug she had once longed to punch his face over. (And occasionally... other things. She'd always been attracted, even when she knew better.)

(She never knew better. She was just scared enough to keep him away until she wasn't, until she wanted him more than she was afraid of him, because he was Hook, he was Killian, and he was the one person who she thought was selfish enough to never leave her. Except in the end, the man he really was, the man who knocked down all her walls, tore off her armor, the man who earned her heart and died to protect it... he wasn’t selfish at all and wasn’t that just painful irony defined.)

"My life means more to me than your conscience, darling," Hook said. "Sorry to disappoint."

God, it hurt. He'd been a survivor because he'd buried his good heart deep, somewhere it couldn't be damaged again, somewhere even a pirate hadn’t been able to find such a treasure. Emma was familiar, because she'd done exactly the same. The difference was, she'd only had a decade to hide her heart away and his had been three centuries deep by the time she met him. It was miraculous, really, that they had known each other for so little time when he'd turned this ship around and returned to help them, to help Henry.

And because she reminded him of the good heart he had, of the good man he'd always wanted to be, because she'd loved him, he ended up dead. Worse, he ended up thinking it was something he deserved, because only good people hated themselves, regretted the bad things they'd done.

"You have never disappointed me," she whispered, realizing the words were true only when she said them out loud. She was heartbroken and she hadn’t known how to say goodbye… but this was how her magic had always worked, wasn’t it? Her emotions controlled it, controlled the portal… sent her somewhere she could say goodbye to him, though she had certainly picked an interesting version of him to appear before.

"No need for pretty lies, love," he quipped. “We understand one another too well for that.”

"I don't lie to you," she said strongly. "I haven't, not since I stopped lying to myself. I'm not her. I'm not... me. The me you know." She rolled her eyes, annoyed with herself and all the bullshit that always accompanied this type of confession. Magic. It was an elemental part of who she was and it still had the power to piss her off.

"All right, then," he said gamely, tapping his lower lip thoughtfully. God he was distracting. Bastard knew it, too. "Who are you?"

Emma took a deep breath. Because whether this is what she was supposed to do or not, if there was one thing she wanted to say to him, one thing she wanted him--any version of him--to know, it was this:

"The woman who loves you," she said, as simply and as honestly as she could. "The woman you love."

His jaw tightened and he took a step back from her. The look in his eye, though, it wasn't the disbelief she had expected, or even the scorn.

It was fear.

She didn't know how much time they had. How much time she had with him or what this even was. Her instincts were the only thing she had to guide her, the memory of his lips against her hand, the tips of his fingers falling away from hers as she stared down at him and couldn’t believe she had failed him, the one person she would do anything for, and she had _failed._

What if this was the last time she got to see him? They’d had so many last moments and it was so hard to give up hope completely when he always found a way, when they always found a way back to each other, and this man, the scared, scarred, desperate man who didn’t know how to live again without anger and betrayal and revenge in his heart… he didn’t understand how much she loved him, didn’t share the same memories, but he was still _him_ and she was suddenly overwhelmed with the need for him to know, to _show_ him.

Emma moved forward, almost smiling when he stepped back, as if she were some evil siren come to steal his soul. Silly man. He'd had her soul by the time they climbed the top of that beanstalk and she'd had his when she left him tied to that tree. They'd both just been too stubborn and broken to admit it. 

His back connected with the ladder and she shushed him, reaching a hand out to his chest. She undid the clasps until she could push it aside, bearing his skin (all right, bearing more of his skin) to her touch. She pressed her palm flat against his ribs, noting the wild flurry of his heart and she smiled, staring into his eyes until they lost their hardness, yearning replacing scorn, hope replacing hate.

Her magic was an easy thing now, after the darkness, after Camelot... after. Healing him was as easy as breathing and she mended his ribs, the unsteady gait, the pain in his leg, the lingering result of his car accident, of his encounters with Gold, his captivity.

"It'll be a few hours before you're a hundred percent," she murmured.

She was trying to decide how she wanted to kiss him. Flirty and challenging, hard and fast, the way she had the first time. Soft and surrendering, endlessly passionate, the way she had the second time.

Desperately and brokenly, hard and soft, the way she had the last time he died in her arms, tearfully distraught, bittersweet and hopeless, the way she had the when she left him last…

In the end, she fell into him, her palm still flat against the skin over his ribs, his gaze lost in hers, hypnotized almost, and she'd wonder if she’d put a spell on him without realizing if that look wasn't so familiar. He had always looked slightly dazed, utterly wrecked, completely amazed by her, and it was only all that armor around her heart that had kept him from seeing for so long that she felt exactly the same about him.

His lips were as soft as ever, the slight push of his surprised breath welcome against her mouth.

"What are you doing to me?" he whispered hoarsely. "What do you want from me?"

"Everything," she muttered, tracing the contour of his sternum up to his throat, the bob of his Adam's apple as he swallowed deeply, then back down, until she reached the laces at his pants. "But I'll settle for this."

It's funny (not really): she'd always said she wasn't a tearful kiss goodbye kind of person, but that was exactly what she was--worse, she was ONLY a tearful kiss goodbye kind of person, only able to completely let go of her fear when she was about to lose something, when she was assured to lose it (him) no matter how hard she tried to hold fast.

But she was definitely crying as she kissed him and he muttered _Swan_ all concerned and _Killian_ the way he did so she kissed him harder, brought both her hands to the front of his leather breeches and palmed him firmly. He rutted against her hand and she rewarded him with friction, only ceasing the motion of her hand to unlace his pants and pull his cock free, the weight of him heavy and warm and perfect in her hand. She stroked him a few times, relishing the gasps and groans that left his mouth, cherishing the pleasure she was able to bring him, tempted to finish him like this but she didn't come all this way (however that worked...) for a tearful goodbye handsy in the Captain's quarters.

“You’re different,” he muttered, his hand slipping under the sweater she wore to stroke his fingers up and down her spine. His hook curved around her hip, the way it always did, and she didn’t know which of his touches she wanted to lean into more.

“How am I different?” she asked, truly wanting to know what he saw in that moment, how he saw her. She also commended him for his ability to form a coherent thought while she had her hands on his dick. Her multitasking pirate…

“That look in your eye… you’ve always been an open book, love, but,” a pause as he bit his lip to stifle a whimper, “it’s as if now you’re just… open. You’re so open.”

“It’s because of you,” she whispered. “You were brave enough to let your walls down first so you could scale mine.”

He was so confused, the poor man, but as usual, he seemed almost content to let her have her way as she stripped them both quicker than she would have liked, yet still slower than she needed in the moment. It was quiet between them, the way it had never been because usually he was busy whispering debauched endearments against her skin, promising all the filthy things he was going to do to her, all the things they’d do to each other, interspersed with heart clenching declarations of love and fidelity and…the quiet wasn’t bad, it was just another side of him, one she was almost glad to know. He deserved this, deserved her fighting for him, being the one to push through and break down, even if he didn’t know it.

“I never saw you coming,” she said, brushing her thumb beneath one kohl-rimmed eye, the other tracing his chest from collarbone to bicep, nipple to sternum. She revisited her favorite paths and charted new ones. The sharp stubbled jut of his jaw, the criminally talented pout of his mouth. Everywhere her hands ventured, her lips soon followed. Emma mouthed at the side of his neck, nibbled at the underside of his ribs, whispered a kiss over each hipbone. His hand, tense but not unwilling, anchored itself in her hair as if he had no idea where he would be allowed to touch her in return. “You’re so beautiful.”

He cleared his throat awkwardly, sounding for a brief moment like the shy deckhand she’d spent too much and too little time with. “I prefer--”

“Devilishly handsome,” she whispered, tugging on his lower lip with her teeth when he opened his mouth in shock at her accurate prediction of his thoughts.

“You’re a bloody witch,” he muttered, though his hand finally lost its hesitance, sliding down her back to her ass. He didn’t ask permission this time, either, just slid underneath the band of her underwear until flesh met flesh.

“You have no idea,” she chuckled, arching back against his hand before pressing forward to thrust against his cock. Emma had trouble deciding what she wanted to feel more and was relieved when he made things easier by pressing hard with his hand and hips at once, giving her both sensations as his mouth found hers again in a hard, demanding kiss.

This was the pirate she knew, the one who took what he wanted and made sure she knew that he had never wanted anything as much as he wanted her.

His hand slid up her back, making shockingly quick work of her bra clasp, one handed at that. Of all the wonders of the modern world that had vexed Killian, her undergarments had never been one of them. He took a moment to appreciate her naked chest before he lowered his head and began feasting, lavishing biting little kisses to the undersides, sucking at her nipples until they were red ( _ripe,_ he’d whispered against her skin once, already inside her, _I like them hard and ripe for my mouth, love_ ) and it felt so good, it felt like everything she’d been longing for, but she didn’t know how much time they had and it wasn’t _enough_.

Emma pulled him by his hook to the bunk, falling to her back and pulling him on top of her. Her hand wrapped around his cock again, the other hand pulling at her underwear.

He chuckled, thrusting slightly into her hand and moving _his_ hand to help remove the final barrier between them. “I do love a woman who knows what she want—Gods above, lass!”

She’d maneuvered him inside, obviously without him even realizing how close they’d gotten. His surprise soon turned to a moan of pleasure as they shifted, his hand angling her the way he liked, the unconscious manhandling cowing her inner feminist by turning her on like nothing ever had. Emma wrapped her arms around his back, dug her fingers into his shoulder blades, trailed them down to clutch and stroke his ass, then started the whole journey over and over again, unable to decide where she most wanted to touch him.

“You feel so good,” she whispered, biting at his earlobe, the dirty one with the earring that had always, always taunted her by being sexier than an ear had any right to be. “You feel perfect.”

“Aye, you too,” he muttered, biting at her shoulder, mouthing over her collarbone until his mouth found hers again and he gave her one of those long, soul deep kisses she had only discovered after taking him to bed; Killian, the gentlemen, had definitely held out on her until they were done ‘courting.’

Hook’s hand ran down her hip, squeezing at the fleshy bits along the way, down her thigh, until he held onto her knee, pulling her leg up so that her calf pressed against his ribcage. She groaned at the new angle, shifting her other leg to match, his hooked arm offering similar leverage. His thrusts were barely even movement, their hips rocking together, the motion of the sea and the ship guiding them, the beats of their heart singing a song Emma had grown familiar with, had taken for granted in the short time they’d been intimate. It had never been like this with anyone else and yet she had treated it like something she would never lose. The thought had her clutching him with every part of her body, pulling a ragged groan from his sinful lips, the sound signaling to her that he was close.

His hand moved between them, fingers rubbing her _just right_ except _where the hell did he think he was going._ Emma used her legs to prevent him from withdrawing, her face clearly expressing to him how fucking insane she felt the attempt was. He skimmed his mouth over her chest in apology.

"Lass... Emma. I won't--I won't get you with child," he muttered, again trying to pull out, to pull away.

Her legs just tightened around him, her ankles locking behind his back. She felt almost feral with want. The timing was wrong, the chances of her getting pregnant were minuscule, but she suddenly wanted it, wanted it because it would be a piece of him, of them, and that little piece of hope--however misplaced--might keep her from breaking. She could imagine it, the second chance she missed with Henry, the baby smell she remembered from the fake memories Regina gave her, except this would be _real_ and this would be a child she could keep, whose best chance would be her, created out of the _true love_ her heart would always, always carry for its father.

She pressed her mouth firmly to his ear. "I want your child," she confessed hoarsely. "I want any part of you I can have, every part of you. If all you gave me was your come, I would still want it, sticky and warm between my legs. I want to feel you there every time I move, for as long as possible.”

She had never been so blunt before, not to Killian, not to any lover, but it was like she'd lit a match. His eyes flashed and he groaned, his hips canting harder into hers, all attempts to pull out, to pull away, forgotten. His mouth sucked a bruise onto the side of her neck and Emma welcomed that, too, encouraging the bite of his fingers on her hip and scruff of his beard on her chest. If this was the last time she would be with him, Emma would have her body marked by him just as much as her heart already was.

It was a moment she wanted to last forever, but it had always been impossible to hold back with him, with each other. Once he was inside, once they were as close as they could be to each other, their bodies knew only bliss. She swallowed his pained pleasure at the intensity of it as her entire body curled against and around his, the pleasure so sharp she had to pull away from his mouth to moan, to release the pressure as she shook and pulsed and fell. His hips rutted unsteadily against hers as he lost his rhythm to the pleasure, the desperate, uneven thrusts hitting her just right, drawing out the pleasure for them both. His ragged breath puffed against her ear, his body a comforting weight, a feeling of safety she would never have again. The thought broke her.

“You’re mine,” she whispered fervently, a vow, a confession, a demand. “You’re mine and I’m yours and nothing will ever change that. You saved me and I tried to save you, too, but I couldn’t. You’re my goddamn fairy tale hero and I couldn’t save you back.” She was crying again and he was comforting her, soothing her with kisses to her brow and the corners of her eyes. He probably thought she was having a breakdown and wondering how crazy the woman he’d just had sex with was, and, well. Sorry, Killian, but it’s been a shit show of a week. 

She still didn’t want to let him go, but… she wasn’t supposed to be here, not in this time. The past Emma, the one with all the armor and a missing son and no idea what was about to hit her—she still needed him.

Emma pressed the same kiss to his lips she had as the Dark One, his eager response allowing the magic to work faster. He wouldn’t be out for long this time. She ran her fingers through his hair, memorizing the way it felt to do so even as she altered the memories of the last half hour from him. Without the Darkness Emma couldn’t take them from him entirely but they would be like remembering a fantasy or a dream. She knew her dirty minded pirate had indulged himself in more than a few fantasies starring her, even at this point, though likely with fewer tears and confusion.

Restoring their clothes was easier. He’d wake and continue on with his life, just the way he had before, back in the Enchanted Forest when he forgot that bar wench who’d kissed him.

Emma pressed her mouth to his forehead, the bridge of his nose, the stubble on his jaw.

“I love you,” she whispered because the words, inadequate but pure, were all she had left to say.

Whatever magic had brought her here crackled and she was sucked back into the portal.

~*~

David’s face was almost comically relieved. “Thank God,” he muttered, his eyes wide and fearful. “You were gone for almost a minute. I thought we lost you.”

_Almost a minute._

Emma wanted to cry. Probably was still already crying; she’d been doing it so much lately that teary eyed was the new normal. Storybrooke looked exactly the same. Her family was gathered around, looking anxious and unsure of how to approach her, what to say. There was nothing, really and there was no time for her overwhelming, unending grief. Hades had betrayed them and he was here, in their town. They were home and they would have to fight for it. Emma felt the armor coming up and she was so sorry for the broken promise, just not sorry enough. 

( _After_ , she goes to the drugstore. Buys one of the tests that promises results as early as the next morning. She doesn’t need the test, not really. She felt it in her bones, the way she hadn’t with Henry because with Henry, she didn’t have magic or true love yet, or any of the things that make up her life now. _Made_ up her life. Henry is the only true love in her life now. She hadn’t admitted it for him, either, until someone was in mortal peril. _Way to be consistent, Swan_.)

(It’s positive, little pink plus sign the best and worst thing she’s ever seen. She wants it more than she’s ever wanted anything and even though she’s going to be alone she doesn’t feel abandoned this time because even though he hadn’t known, this was a gift, the last gift he gave her, the one that would help her keep her promise: she couldn’t keep her armor up because it had to be down to love his child with every ounce of vulnerable, crazy love in her body.

She promises again to keep her promise.)

(What she doesn’t know, not yet, is that a million worlds away and a million miles down in the Underworld, a single leaf sprouts onto the Ambrosia tree, old wounds knitting together on the ancient wood. The dead can’t create life, no matter how true their love, but the truest love will always find a way.) 

(Killian never stops fighting, even though he hadn’t wanted to give her the false hope, to keep her with him when it might be impossible to return. He has no intention of moving on. He does everything he can to protect her, even from so far away. For once, it’s enough. It is _just_ enough.)

(In the end, love wins. Love always wins. His living breath is a promise in her ear, the strong beat of his heart the compass she will always use to guide her home.)


End file.
